1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a barcode scanner and an operational method of the barcode scanner, and more particularly, to a barcode scanner for detecting depth information of an object and an operational method thereof.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A barcode is a figure identification code which is arranged according to a specific encoding rule for presenting certain messages. One-dimensional barcodes, such as EAN-8, are composed of a plurality of parallel black stripes with different widths. Two-dimensional barcodes, such as the Quick Response code (QR code), are rectangular figures composed of a plurality of black rectangles, and three corners of the rectangular figure include specific positioning marks to facilitate reading. Since a barcode can be used to identify manufacturing country, product's name, manufacturing date and manufacturer's name of a product, sender's and recipient's mailing addresses, book category number or date, etc., it is therefore widely applied in many fields.
When one desires to transform a barcode into meaningful information via a barcode scanner, he or she needs to hold the barcode scanner towards the object with the barcode so as to capture an original image which includes the object. The barcode scanner then locates the barcode's location and analyzes the information recorded in the barcode. Since the barcode presents recorded information via specific arrangement of the black figures and the spaces, it would be difficult to scan a barcode if the environment surrounding the object is not uniform in brightness when the object is scanned. To avoid such situations, the barcode scanner may emit compensating light via a compensating light source to compensate the insufficient environmental lighting. When the barcode scanner is too close to the scanned object, however, most of the compensating light, if not all, is reflected from the object that it is difficult to identify the barcode.
When a barcode scanner is included as part of a Point of Sale (POS) system, since the barcode scanner may be used in a large warehouse with a complicated environment, the original image captured by the barcode scanner may include more than one object. Under such circumstances, it would be more difficult for the barcode scanner to locate the position of the barcode and would take more time to complete the scanning process. Furthermore, because the scanned object is not in a uniformed shape, the one-dimensional or two-dimensional barcode may be disposed on a curved surface of an object and thus distorted. It would be difficult to decode the barcode information transformed from the original image.
Thus, it is important to solve the problems resulted from reflection of compensating lights from objects, barcode images with complicated backgrounds, and barcode image distortion due to uneven object surfaces on which a barcode is disposed.